The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Kalanchoe plant, botanically known as Kalanchoe blossfeldiana, and hereinafter referred to by the name `Soft Katharina`.
The new Kalanchoe is a product of a planned breeding program conducted by the Inventor in Hinnerup, Denmark. The objective of the breeding program was to create new freely-flowering Kalanchoe cultivars with compact plant habit and excellent postproduction longevity. The new Kalanchoe is a naturally-occurring whole plant mutation of the Kalanchoe blossfeldiana cultivar Katharina, disclosed in U.S. Plant patent application Ser. No. 09/334,028. The cultivar Soft Katharina was discovered and selected by the Inventor as a flowering plant within a population of plants of the cultivar Katharina in a controlled environment in Hinnerup, Denmark.
Asexual reproduction of the new Kalanchoe by terminal cuttings taken at Hinnerup, Denmark, by the Inventor, has shown that the unique features of this new Kalanchoe are stable and reproduced true to type in successive generations.